Bad roads vs bad drivers

THE EDITOR, Madam:

A fair amount of pounding has been given to the road conditions that currently exist, because no normal person looks forward to zigzagging around the many potholes that randomly pop up as one drives along the roadway.

Potholes are the enemies of tyres, front ends and other mechanical parts of motor vehicles that they attack mercilessly. Sometimes passengers are injured because of the erratic way motorists have to drive to avoid them.

However, despite the above, potholes can also serve useful purposes by slowing down irresponsible drivers who speed and put other persons at risk. Potholes can serve as natural speed killers, just like speed bumps do. And, because many drivers seem to value their cars over human lives, those otherwise disgusting plagues can restrain bad drivers and force them to cut their speed to safer levels. It is not the ideal speed enforcement to have, since damaged roads can endanger human lives and leave person suffering long-lasting harm.

Yet, the fact that bad road conditions can even be useful in reducing bad driving means that the problem is more a problem of irresponsible drivers than of substandard road conditions. For, when you remove those physical shackles from reckless drivers and they see freedom stretching before them on the well-paved roadways, fatalities usually rise.

HOMER SYLVESTER

Elmsford, New York